No, it is simply the code of the program, external to this "reality", that causes it to flow. These internal 'processes' that appear to result in pain or various chemicals being produced in the brain obey no internal laws of their own - not only are they physically unreal but their interactions with each other are unreal.
Per the madhyamaka reality is not real, nor unreal, nor neither real nor unreal, or both real and unreal etc.
Intellectually it is best understood in terms of dependent origination. But the process of dependent origination is also not something to be clung to as inherently true either.
That they are not inherently real means that they are dependent on many other things. And other things in turn are dependent on some other stuff else. And so on.